


I'll fix your broken heart, I'll make it beat again

by charthur



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: M/M, Magic Revealed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-07
Updated: 2013-04-07
Packaged: 2017-12-07 19:30:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/752191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charthur/pseuds/charthur
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>1.10 aftermath.</p><p>Will has died and Merlin is heartbroken on the journey back to Camelot. Arthur doesn't know what to do.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I'll fix your broken heart, I'll make it beat again

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first time writing in this fandom and I don’t even know how it happened but it did so here you go I hope you enjoy! It’s unbeta’d because I don’t really know anyone in the fandom, so any mistakes are my own!
> 
> The name of this fic is taken from a lyric in the song "Taking Over Me" by Lawson. You should check them out, they are gifts from the gods.

The night after Will passes away, Arthur and Merlin are lying side by side on Hunith’s hard floor, the thin blankets keeping them surprisingly warm in the late autumn chill. Arthur stares blankly up at the ceiling and pretends not to hear Merlin’s quiet sobs.

His fingers itch to comfort his manservant, but he doesn't know how. He rolls onto his side facing away from Merlin, squeezes his eyes tightly shut and tries to think of anything that doesn't include Will’s choking last words and the sparkle that has deserted Merlin’s eyes.

It doesn't work.

*

The ride back to Camelot is silent, and Arthur knows that everybody’s mind is back in Ealdor, on the still-smoking pyre they left behind at dawn. The silence claws at Arthur’s insides, and he wants to find something to say that will pull Merlin back from the sadness he is drowning in. But Arthur has never been good with words, not when they really matter, not when it doesn’t involve saving Camelot or rallying peasants. When it means talking about emotions and feelings, Arthur’s brain shuts down, something he no doubt inherited from Uther. But he needs to make Merlin understand that he is here, that he does care, because the idea of Merlin thinking he is alone in his grief is too much for Arthur to comprehend.

He rides a little closer to Merlin, so that their legs knock together occasionally, and gives Merlin a quirk of the lips when Merlin turns his head questioningly.

The satisfying feeling he gets in the pit of his stomach when Merlin returns the smile is something Arthur doesn’t dwell on too much afterwards.

*

“We’re going to push ahead, get back to Camelot before nightfall.” Morgana tells him while they rest just outside the citadel. Arthur nods and goes to grab his bag, but Morgana rests a hand on his shoulder, the ghost of a smile dancing around her lips.

“I meant myself and Guinevere.” Arthur straightens up, and Morgana shifts her eyes to where Merlin sits on a fallen tree, prodding the ground with a stick dejectedly. “He needs you right now, more than Camelot does.” 

“I don’t know what to say.” He admits quietly, closing his eyes as Morgana runs her fingers through his hair soothingly, the way she used to when he was younger and Uther had shouted at him for three hours after he had snuck into town to play hide and seek with Leon.

“You’ll figure it out, you always do.” She kisses his cheek, and then she’s gone, and Arthur is left with a heartbroken manservant and no idea of what to do next.

*

The night spreads quickly after the girls leave. The prolonged silence between he and Merlin stretches Arthur’s nerves to breaking point; every rustle of leaves in the wind makes him jump, every twig snapped by a small woodland creature draws his sword. Merlin stokes the fire after setting down their sleeping bags, sitting with his back to Arthur, his hunched figure making Arthur’s brain hurt. 

After a while, he can’t bear it anymore. He moves to sit on the other side of the fire so he can see Merlin’s face, his cheekbones defined by the fire that flickers beneath him. He looks otherworldly, and Arthur has to swallow three times before he can speak.

“Tell me about him.” It’s a quiet request and Merlin takes so long to reply Arthur almost thinks he hasn’t heard him.

But reply he does.

“When I was eight, I went through a phase of wanting to be a hunter. Don’t laugh.” Arthur stifles the snort, and Merlin smirks down at the fire. “As you can imagine, I wasn’t very good at it. And I ended up climbing a tree after a bird.” Arthur can’t help the laugh that escapes him this time, and holds up his hands in apology.

“Sorry, go ahead.” Merlin tilts his head to the side, but obliges.

“I was stuck in the tree for the whole day.” Merlin smiles into the fire at the memory, and Arthur’s heart clenches slightly. “I thought I was going to have to build a nest and live in the tree for the rest of my life, but luckily my mother got worried and sent Will to find me.”

“How’d he get you down?” Arthur asks, and Merlin breaks into the first real grin Arthur has seen on him since it happened.

“He climbed up and pushed me out.” Arthur laughs because yes, that sounds exactly like Will. 

The laughter dies away and the silence creeps back in again, and Arthur hates the crease that forms on Merlin’s forehead as he stares into the fire once more. He wants nothing more than to smooth the crease out, but his mouth has other ideas; he words the one thing that has been eating him up ever since Ealdor.

“Did you know?” Merlin looks up at him, his head tilted to the side, and he looks tired but Arthur can’t stop now. “About his magic. Did you know?” What little colour there was in Merlin’s face drains, his eyes widen, and now Arthur wishes he could take the words back. But he needs to know. 

The silence says it all, and Arthur runs his hands over his face, suddenly exhausted.

“If he had lived, what would you have done?” Merlin’s voice is stronger now, and it makes Arthur start.

“What?”

“I mean, he used magic in front of you. If he had lived, would you have taken him to Uther?” The steel edge to Merlin’s voice sends actual shivers up Arthur’s spine, and his eyes narrow at his manservant.

“Do you really think me so low? Besides, it wasn’t in Camelot, so technically there wasn’t anything I could have done even if I had wanted to.” Arthur leans forward, steepling his fingers together and frowning.

“What if he had been? What if we had been in Camelot, and Will had saved your life using magic? What if he did it more than once, what if it was his destiny?” Merlin’s voice is losing the edge and becoming less stable, his eyes welling with tears as he becomes hysterical and Arthur doesn’t know what’s happening so he goes to Merlin’s side, gripping his forearm tightly.

“But he hadn’t, we weren’t-“

“It was me!” Merlin yells so loud Arthur hears the beating of wings as birds vacate a nearby tree. Arthur blinks, not understanding.

“What are you yabbering about now, Merlin?” He asks, and Merlin pulls his arm away from Arthur, standing up and running his hands through his hair jerkily, the tears falling thick and fast down his face now.

“I’m the sorcerer, not Will! I was the one who conjured the windstorm, Will was just protecting me because he knew how dangerous telling you would be but I can’t let you believe that Will was in the wrong when it’s me that has this power!” His speech is rocky, punctuated with sobs and Arthur feels like he’s been punched in the gut.

How could _Mer_ lin be a sorcerer? Merlin; his clumsy, stupid, idiotic manservant who always had a smile at hand a cried over _unicorns_ , for God’s sake. 

There are only two things Arthur knows about magic; it’s dangerous and those who wield it are powerful. And these two things definitely don’t coincide with his Merlin.

“You’re lying.” Arthur says flatly, and Merlin’s hands drop, his jaw tightening. He lifts a hand, murmurs a word that Arthur doesn’t understand, and his eyes shine a molten gold as wind picks up just as it had in Ealdor; the leaves and dirt fly around Arthur as he stands up, torn between horror and fascination. The gold fades from Merlin’s irises as the wind drops, only leaving the startling blue that both begs Arthur to understand, and dares him not to. 

“But-“ Arthur doesn’t know what to say or do. “How? Why?”

“Why what?” Merlin asks, his voice is steadier and his eyes are dry now.

“Why did you come to Camelot? _Why did you lie to me?_ ” He was angry now, because surely, surely, he would have known somehow if his manservant – no, not his manservant, his friend – was a sorcerer.

“Why did I lie to you? Are you really asking me that question?” Merlin laughs, but it holds no humour. “Because you’re the Kings’ son!”

“I am not my father!” Arthur protests.

“But you are his _son_!” Merlin bellows. “You’ve had it drilled into you from a young age that magic is evil, you’ve stood by and watched as innocent people are slaughtered for even thinking about magic and done nothing to protect them! What did you expect me to do?”

“I expect you to trust me!” Arthur fires back, because what else can he say? He feels like he has failed – whether it’s himself, or Merlin, though, he is unsure. “After everything that has happened between us, everything we’ve been through, you kept this huge secret from me.”

“You threw me in the stocks for calling you a prat!” Merlin yells.

“That was before I knew you! Before-“ Arthur stops, he can’t bring himself to speak the words spinning around his mind. He hangs his head, resting it between his palms, his head thumping with everything he has found out. 

“What are you going to do?” Merlin’s voice makes him look up. He expects something to have changed, some shift that would give away the fact Merlin holds this power. But it’s still his Merlin – gangly limbs and big ears, his forehead creased with worry and fear. He looks so wound up that Arthur just wants to protect him, to shield him from whatever is the cause of that fear.

But Arthur is the cause of that fear, and therein lays the problem.

“Can you wipe my memory?” Arthur asks. Merlin’s eyebrows lift in surprise – whatever he had been expecting Arthur to say, this hadn’t been it.

“What?” Arthur stands and strides across to Merlin, gripping his forearms with his hands tight enough to bruise. If he is hurting Merlin, however, the manservant doesn’t show it.

“Can you wipe my memory? Make me forget you ever told me this. Make me think that we just stopped outside Camelot for the night to give you another day to think through Will’s death, and that’s the end?” Merlin flinches at the mention of Will, but shakes his head.

“No.” Arthur scoffs, shaking his head.

“And I thought having magic meant having power.” 

“I didn’t say I couldn’t. I said I wouldn’t.” Arthur’s eyes narrow, but Merlin holds his own.

“You will do as I say, I am your master.” He grits out.

“No, sire.” Arthur lets Merlin go with a slight shove.

“Dammit Merlin, I’m not asking you!” His anger is returning, faster than he had ever thought it could, and he struggles to get a handle on it.

“Why are you asking me to do this?” Merlin asks desperately.

“Because I can’t take you back to Camelot knowing what I do! I’m directly disobeying my father by bringing in a sorcerer, and if he finds out then we’re both heading to our deaths.”

“So send me away.” 

“No.” His answer is so fierce that Merlin recoils.

“Why?”

“Because I said no.”

“But it would be so simple! You could tell your father I decided to stay in Ealdor with my mother,  
he’d get you a new manservant and you’d forget all about me.” Merlin’s shoulders slump at the thought, and Arthur’s anger flairs.

“I said, no.” He growls.

“Why not?”

“ _Mer_ lin.”

“Tell me, Arthur.”

“Merlin, I am warning you-“

“Tell me!”

“Because I can’t live without you!” Arthur shouts. There is silence once more in the forest; the only sound is of their breathing coming out of both of them in rapid puffs of air. Merlin stares at him with wide eyes, not a trace of gold in the clear blue irises. “Are you happy now? I can’t send you away because I can’t risk something happening to you when I’m not there to stop it.” Arthur runs his hands through his hair, gripping tightly on the strands and squeezing his eyes shut. 

He starts when he feels Merlin’s hands, surprisingly strong yet soft, gently unclenching Arthur’s fists and threads their fingers together. When Arthur opens his eyes, Merlin is standing not inches away from him, his breath warming Arthur’s cold lips.

“I know, okay? I get it.” Merlin speaks very softly, his lips barely moving and his eyes never leaving Arthur's. “But I won’t make you forget what I told you. You need to know that my magic, everything I do with it, is for you, Arthur. I would never use it to hurt you, only to protect you.” He rests his forehead against Arthur's and looks at their entwined hands.

“I never thought you’d use it to hurt me.” Arthur says truthfully, because it hadn’t crossed his mind for even a second. 

“I wouldn’t, I swear.” Merlin says adamantly, raising his head to look at Arthur again. He takes a deep breath, as if debating internally over what to say. “It’s your destiny to become the greatest King Albion has ever known, Arthur.” His hand unravels from Arthur’s and slips it through Arthur’s hair instead, his thumb gently stroking Arthur’s temple. “And it is my destiny to get you there. And if you knowing about my magic helps that, then there is no way I am making you forget it.” Arthur sighs, but nods, and this time it is he whose forehead falls forward to rest against Merlin’s. 

“Okay. I… Okay.” And because Merlin is so close, because he doesn’t know when he’ll get him this close again, he does the thing he has wanted to do since the day Merlin barged into his life and called him a prat.

He kisses him.

*

The following morning dawns as bright and clear as the previous day, and Arthur mounts his horse with a smile. He looks across to his manservant, who is where he always will be; by his side.

“Ready to go, sire?” The smile that Merlin gives him is dazzling, and Arthur nods.

“Lead the way, sorcerer.” He smirks as Merlin rolls his eyes, and follows him out of the trees to see the walls of his castle in the distance.


End file.
